Organic Bean Growing History

Beans are one of the longest-cultivated plants

It goes without saying (but not here) that the first beans were organically grown. The term “organic” is a recent concept. Before WWII the word was not so popular. It wasn’t until a deadly war that the world began to develop chemical fertilizers to increase the populations 4 fold. Before then all crops were “organic”.

Eve grew “organic” beans!? I was told that Adam and Eve actually had their encounter with a yard long pole bean, not a snake after they eat the wrong/right mushroom. That’s hard to verify so lets not elaborate and get on to something verifiable. Broad beans, in their wild state, the size of a small fingernail, were gathered in Afghanistan and the Himalayan foothills. This is verifiable in a scholarly abstract Agricultural Origins: Centers and Noncenter by Chester F. Gorman. (incredible article) But not until the second millennium BC did cultivated, large-seeded broad beans appear in Europe.

The broad bean is said to have been brought to Britain by the Romans 2000 years ago. It was also an important crop sown by monks during the Middle Ages. Organic beans were an important source of protein throughout Old and New World history, and still are today. I can verify that because I live and work in Central America, Costa Rica the black bean capital of the world. Everybody here likes Gillo Pinto (beans & rice) for breakfast, lunch, dinner and desert. The desert comes with cream on top so don’t scrunch your nose at the idea.
The oldest-known domesticated beans (obviously they were organic beans) in the Americas were found in Guitarrero Cave, an archaeological site in Peru, and dated to around the second millennium BC. Most of the varieties popular today come originally from the Americas. This was verified by Europeans when Columbus’s crew found 5 types growing in fields, domesticated by pre-Columbian peoples. One especially famous use of beans by pre-Columbian people is the “Three Sisters” method of companion plant cultivation.

Optimum Element Levels

Nutrient

Limit in PPM

Avg. PPM

Major Elements

Nitrogen

150-1000

250

Phosphorus

50-100

80

Potassium

100-400

300

Minor Elements

Calcium

100-500

200

Magnesium

50-100

75

Sulfur

200-1000

400

Trace Elements

Copper

0.1-0.5

0.7

Iron

2-10

5

Boron

0.5-5.0

1.0

Manganese

0.5-5

2.0

Molybdenum

.01-.05

.02

Zinc

.5-1.0

.5

.

Conversions for ppm, %, mg/kg

1mg/kg = 1ppm

1mg/L = 1ppm

1ppm = 0.0001%

1mg/kg = 0.0001%

1% = 10,000ppm

1% = 10,000mg/kg

.

ppm to/from milliSiemens/cm

multiply the milliSiemens/cm reading by 1000 and divide by 2 to get your ppm, or simply multiply by 500

or

divide the ppm reading by 1000 and multiply by 2 to get your milliSiemens/cm reading, or simply divide by 500

Equations and Symbols

Get Up-to-Speed on Microorganisms

Soluable Salt Ranges

Keeping up on your soluble salt range is important. Always have an instrument at hand to check your nutrient levels. The below chart is a general guide as to what levels are acceptable or not.

Desireable

Permisable

Dangerous

EC

.75-2 mS

2-3 mS

3 mS & ↑

PPM

500-1300

1300-2000

2000 & ↑

Electrical Conductivity (EC) of a solution is a measure of ionic compounds dissolved in water. Organic Nutrients are ionic compounds. Another name for ionic compounds is salts. Assuming the water had very little EC before you added the liquid fertilizer, measuring the EC will tell us how much fertilizer we have in our liquid. EC is commonly measured in milli-siemens (mS) and/or Total Dissolved Solids (TDS) expressed in Parts Per Million (PPM). Both will give you the same information of how much fertilizer is in your liquid. The EC and PPM are always in relation. So stating the EC and PPM is redundant. The relationship is 1 EC (measured in mS) = 650 PPM.

About BioChar Pyrolysis

Quote from:
Daniel D. Warnock & Johannes Lehmann & Thomas W. Kuyper & Matthias C. Rillig
"Biochar is a term reserved for the plant biomass derived
materials contained within the black carbon
(BC) continuum. This definition includes chars and
charcoal, and excludes fossil fuel products or geogenic
carbon (Lehmann et al. 2006). Materials
forming the BC continuum are produced by partially
combusting (charring) carbonaceous source materials,
e.g. plant tissues (Schmidt and Noack 2000; Preston
and Schmidt 2006; Knicker 2007), and have both
natural as well as anthropogenic sources. Restricting the oxygen supply during combustion can prevent complete combustion (e.g., carbon volatilization and
ash production) of the source materials. When plant
tissues are used as raw materials for biochar production,
heat produced during combustion volatilizes a
significant portion of the hydrogen and oxygen, along
with some of the carbon contained within the plant’s
tissues (Antal and Gronli 2003; Preston and Schmidt
2006).... Depending on the temperatures
reached during combustion and the species identity
of the source material, a biochar’s chemical and
physical properties may vary (Keech et al. 2005;
Gundale and DeLuca 2006). For example, coniferous biochars generated at lower temperatures, e.g. 350°C, can contain larger amounts of available nutrients,
while having a smaller sorptive capacity for cations
than biochars generated at higher temperatures, e.g.
800°C (Gundale and DeLuca 2006). Furthermore,
plant species with many large diameter cells in their
stem tissues can lead to greater quantities of macropores
in biochar particles. Larger numbers of macropores
can for example enhance the ability of biochar
to adsorb larger molecules such as phenolic compounds
(Keech et al. 2005)."
Check out the entire report at:
Mycorrhizal Responses to Biochar in Soil–Concepts and Mechanisms"

Biochar & Fungi Relationship

Cation Exchange Capacity Information Blurb

The total CEC is impacted by these factors:
Amount of active humus such as compost, Amount of passive humus such as Biochar, The pyrolysis method of the Biochar added, Was the Biochar activated and/or inoculated? The type and amount of microorganisms, and The overall pH